Randi has already dropped her MF gear, and now wears full safety questing gear. She shopped 2x +2 Assassin skills claws, and is almost ready for the NM Ancients.
A couple of words not spoken by the picture. I saw one unique pack of Frenzytaurs. Not bad at all. But what I didn't see, was that there were actually two unique packs right next to each other (the unseen being Cold Enchanted,) and a third unique pack of Frenzytaurs right behind those two!
I thought she was going to deeds. She was getting hit locked by a single Frenzytaur, with more coming in behind. She got lucky.
Divide and conquer won out.
Drystan, great that you survived that, but where are your rejuves???
I always quest with at least two full columns of them, usually 3!
@Morathi: nice to see you in, and good luck with Xavier. :thumbsup:
Brad and Flux have conquered Act III. Really quite dull, I must say. The only real excimetent was provided by Mephisto, accompanied by an annyoing Blood Lord. Of course I didn´t want Meteors and stuff pestering me while fighting Meph, so I went after the Blood Lord first. I was using Crushflange in this fight, and I could barely kill that freakin' vampire! It leeched back more life than I hit it for. All the while, Meph was not particularly kind to us with his cold/lightning freakshow...
Only when Flux moved to a better position could we take down the Blood Lord with our combined efforts.
Kind of funny when you think about it..."Yeah, yeah, you´re a Prime Evil and all, but please give us a moment to take down this guy first."
The only new skill I have rolled is Stun. Tried it some, but Bash seems to be a better and safer boss killing skill.
I now keep a Sturdy Horned Helm of the Jackal with +2 Find Item with me in the backpack all the time, and after each fight, I switch helms and hork the corpses. That´s a lot of gear switching. Annoying, but I asked myself: "Would you rather not be as wealthy and as good as you can?".
Well, of course not!
OK, so I have already made some MF compromises by not giving Flux any MF gear (which has the added advantage that I do not need to bother with whom gets the kills) but choosing not to hork all corpses means I will miss out on gems and runes, and I am not prepared to do that. I really hope I can eventually find a 3s barb helm with +3 Find Item. :badteeth:
[Highlight]Brad the Barbarian and Flux the Lightning Wolf, level 32, Pandemonium Fortress[/Highlight]
Drystan, that's a scary screenshot. I'm also interested to know about your purple situation. Sometimes I have to use more than a single row to escape otherwise certain death; maybe that's what you had to recently do yourself, or are you just living on the edge!?
I usually only have 2 and 3 as Juvie slots, when I have enough dropped juvies. Otherwise, I use slot 3, and have 1 and 2 as healing for all/any minor injury. At the moment, I don't really have enough. It's not that she's gotten into danger, it's just few have dropped since I last used them. Also, a lack of inventory space (I don't use extended stash,) and I can't store them either. I never cube them, and I prefer Healing potions, as I use healing to heal after poison, after almost every bit of damage. So I use healing a lot more often. Unfortunately, using Arctic's belt, I only have two rows... Oops!
Edit: That last battle was a bit of foreshadowing:
One-hit KO, by Korlic (standard attack,) with 600+ life in Nightmare. He had Holy Shock, against 75% Lightning Resist.
[highlight]RIP Randi_TrueBlood, level 60 Random Assassin, and Blaise the Rogue: Act 5 NM to Korlic[/highlight]
R.I.P. Randi.
1-hit KO is unbelievably nasty. And here I thought that 1-hit killings from NM Ancients had ended when they nerfed the FE bug in v1.11...
He must have scored a critical hit with his Cruel Bec-de-Corbin of Evisceration, or something like that...
On to happier things: Brad the Barbarian has made very good progress.
Act IV was (as expected) slow going. Brad sure isn´t powerful, and Flux isn´t either. But with their combined efforts, it was bearable. I used Taunt a lot in this act: for squelching demon Infernos, for making spawners not spawn so much, for keeping corpse easters from destroying MY horkific corpses, etc.
Maggot babies en masse in the River area. No shortage of potions because of this, since I used Find Potion on their corpses. To my surprise, I often found full rejuves doing this. Pretty cool drops for being in Normal.
Stats for the upcoming Diablo fight. Lord De Seis' drop (which, btw, was Brad´s first succesful superunique hork) got me two nice items for this fight: a cold/lightning resist shield (with better blocking than my usual Milabrega´s) and Hawkmail.
I have to say it was one of the safest Diablo fights I´ve played in Normal. Never any real danger. Barbs are kings with the healing potions. They gain 680 life on a big one (with a good chance of doubling it) - amazing.
Diablo´s drop was great - Bloodletter unique Gladius.
Bloodletter improved my killing speed a lot, and made for a very relaxed Act V. I got lucky again, and found a Shael rune on Arreat Plateu, just before it was time to face those frost breathers in Crystalline Passage.
No good barb helm had showed up before level 39, and since I´d had great topaz luck until then, I bought an Artisan´s Great Helm of Brilliance and stuffed it full with perfect topazes. Soon after that, I found this:
Assault Helmet
Defense: 32
Durability: 31 of 50
(Barbarian Only)
Required Strength: 55
Required Level: 18
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 35
Fingerprint: 0x8e7c3052
+2 to Find Item (Barbarian Only)
+3 to Iron Skin (Barbarian Only)
+3 to Increased Stamina (Barbarian Only)
Socketed (3: 0 used)
The sockets are my doing, with the recipe. About halfway though the act, my magical +2 Find Item helm got lost in a game crash, so I have been toting along this non-magical one instead. I am up to 1 perfect, 2 flawless, 1 regular and 1 flawed topaz in my stash now. This helm is hopefully up and running full time not too far into Act 1 NM...
(I think it´s cool that it also has some fighting use (the Iron Skin bonus))
I used Taunt a lot on the Lashers, to prevent the boars from mutating. More drops and exp for me that way.
Something weird happened during this. Twice, actually. Do you see it?
Yes, the Lasher hit me with that red 'pump' aura thingy. Brad became very fast - something along the lines of +60% FRW! I should have checked his damage. I´d bet it was much higher than normal.
Brad has been lucky overall with his stats. Energy has received fewest point, then it´s pretty even between the other three.
New skills since the last update: Leap Attack, Concentrate, Double Swing, Whirlwind, Battle Cry (4 points!) and Battle Command. I still just use Attack the most, but it´s good to have Concentrate when it gets rough. I love that skill! It´s so damn steady and reliable. It´s so...me. :smug:
With the good damage, IAS and life steal from Bloodletter, Brad can tank almost anything the game can throw at him at this stage.
I sold my poison charm all the way back when I started to use the 'Steel' Flail in Act II, and I haven´t found another one yet, so all mosters regenerate when I fight them. This made it ungodly slow to kill a Minion of Destruction. I bought a temporary Throwing Knife of Vileness from Malah just for the other MoD. Hit once with this knife, and Bloodletter for the rest.
Horking has improved in Act V. A bit into the act, I found a rare Giant Sword with +1 Barbarian skills, and started to use that on my switch for horking. Then I suddenly realized: "Hey, I´m a bit over level 40 now. Malah sells some really low-qlvl throwing weapons. She should be able to provide me with some Resonant weapons!" Oh yeah, it didn´t take me long before I had +4 on the switch. Along with Battle Command and my hork helm, that meant level 7 Find Item. :thumbsup:
What was really weird was that I progressed several more areas in Act V before I realized that this switch would also be good for my other warcries.
I think it took me this long because:
- Brad didn´t really need any BO and stuff for normal gameplay
- I rarely ever use a 'prebuff switch' with my characters. I usually prefer utility items in those slots, or ranged weapons with good damage.
By the time I got to the Ancients, the prebuff switch was well established, though. When it was time to fight Baal, Brad could now go over 700 life for the first time (with level 1+4+1 BO). Not much for a level 49 Barbarian, but a helluva lot more than the average character I play in late Normal.
[Highlight]Destroyer Brad the Barbarian and Flux the Lightning Iron Wolf, level 49, Moo Moo Farm next[/Highlight]
My duo moves on, at a reasonable pace. Bloodletter is starting to feel a little weak, though.
Bash is an amazing boss killing skill! I find it odd that that´s not something that´s much talked about. It was the same with Smite for my No-Vita Paladin. I guess playing these goofy undepowered characters really opens up chances to discover some real gems among overlooked skills. After I have played a Berserker (maybe I´ll add one as a third char in Morathi´s Exposure tourney...), my next Barbarian after that is going to be a Basher!
Exhibit A: After I had managed to find a spot where the sparks didn´t hit, can you guess how much damage old Woody did to Brad? Answer: none.
Exhibit B: Cursed Extra Strong Ghoul. Pretty dangerous in melee, huh? Not in this situation. Poor dude has 1/3 life left, and is Brad even Amped? Just sayin'...
I see Bash as 'Smite light'. Not quite as über, because it isn´t auto-hitting.
Most dangerous monsters in Act I? Spitters, without a doubt. Taunt made them much easier to handle (it´s much better that they try to bite me than spit on me, since I am way above their level, have almost 1100 Defense and blocking in the high fifties), but they were still troublesome. I think they have high physical and lightning resistances.
Some news on the item front:
* Found a 4s Gothic Plate really early. Underground Passage, I think. At that point, I had 2 perfect topazes. 48% MF was more than my current 39% armor, so I switched to the Gothic Plate right away. It´s now fully topazed. So the frantic helm switching (between killing time and horking time) will continue for quite a while longer. I am up to two flawless topazes now.
* Found Spineripper (unique Poignard). Damage, speed and life steal is on par with Bloodletter. ITD and PMH are nice, but a major drawback is that there is no dagger mastery, so I won´t get those critical hits I like so much. And the range 1 sucks. So I´ve stashed Spineripper. Maybe if I can upgrade it, I´ll start using it. Bone Knife has more reasonable requirements than Falcata.
* Crafted these pretty sweet gloves at clvl 49 (I can´t use them for a while - dunno why the lvl requirment is so high):
[Highlight]Plague Claw
Heavy Gloves[/Highlight]
Defense: 11
Durability: 11 of 14
Required Level: 57
Item Version: 1.10+ Expansion
Item Level: 51
Fingerprint: 0x710f0210
+11 to Life
+61% Enhanced Defense
Cold Resist +19%
2% Life stolen per hit
20% Increased Attack Speed
6% Chance of Crushing Blow
+1 to Martial Art Skills (Assassin Only)
* The Rhyme Bone Shield is now given to Flux (which means his resists are maxed). I will probably make a Splendor shield for him later.
Brad now uses a Rhyme Tower Shield. Despite no FRW on items, having a heavy shield and a medium weight armor doesn´t bother me. Why not? Because I have freakin' level 5 (+1) Increased Speed...
* Halfway though Act I, I took the plunge and installed RWM. Less than half an area later, a 4s Crystal Sword dropped (my 5th or 6th 4-socketed 1h-sword in NM, they seem to drop often). Endgame weapon for Flux is hereby secured. :whistling:
(Well, maybe not...got only 26% FCR: Depending on the other gear, getting one with at least 30% may make a difference.)
Wow, first time ever I have bothered with a FCR table...(haven´t played any casters that spam a main skill). For those who are interested, an unassisted Act III merc has an 18 frames casting speed, then the breakpoints are at 10, 15, 30, 40, 60, 90 and 140 FCR (my info source didn´t have any numbers for FCR not dividable by 5). Flux currently has +71%, which means a 13 frames casting time. I just wish he´d use Lightning more often.
* Found Peasant Crown. Quite nice, it may see some use later.
* Found a +266% ED Bonesnap. Interesting...
The last level-up, down in Stony Tomb, gave me my first point in War Cry. That could be useful. Still waiting for my first point in Berserk.
Every level up now has 28 options for skill point placement. I can get anything except Frenzy or Grim Ward.
[Highlight]Destroyer Brad the Barbarian and Flux the Lightning Iron Wolf, level 54, NM Dry Hills next[/Highlight]
Modnar the barbarian has reached level 26 and just killed Duriel! Damn that dude hits hard!
Still using double swing with some swords. Made Steel (TirEl), and the other broadsword is Isenhart.
The Good:
-Berserker's hauberk and Cathan's Seal dropped during act 2!
-Still got my Ethereal Knell striker for boss fights
- I have a point in howl and shout now! Making a big difference.
The Bad:
- In the past 4 levels I think I put only 1 point into strength. Getting really bad luck with my attributes.
...and The Ugly:
- I have a high dexterity and I want to switch to shield (so I won't die!) but having 4 points in double swing and 4 points in bash as synergy is keeping me a dual swinging reckless berserker.
Hey! Not bad so far - this could still become a bonemancer :wink: So, you saved up some skill points, right? Probably 2-3? Do you plan to avoid the summoning tree, at least till you have CE? Good luck and welcome to the madness!
Hey! Not bad so far - this could still become a bonemancer :wink: So, you saved up some skill points, right? Probably 2-3? Do you plan to avoid the summoning tree, at least till you have CE? Good luck and welcome to the madness!
Honestly, I hadn't even thought about optimizing skill distribution by saving up skill points yet. I just bludgeoned everything in the blood moor until it was clear and then rolled the stat/skill points I had accumulated at the end. I guess I should have stopped rolling after I got the point in teeth to optimize my shot at early CE.
I would love if Randy randomly became a bonemancer, but I have a feeling that before this is over I'm going to have points in blood golem
Modnar the random Barbarian is level 29 and has just finished Act III! :wave:
Things are going awful. The beginning of the act went great, going around /players 5, as soon as I reached Kurast, I felt like I hit a wall!
My damage output was suddenly AWFUL (no wonder, my attributes suck), could barely kill anything, even on players 1. I'm pretty sure the only reason I defeated Stormtree was because I had a combat shrine boost! Meph dropped jack **** even with my MF gear
Razortine dropped somewhere in Kurast... I am now using it as my main weapon. Damage sucks, but I can bash dudes with it and keep a safe distance. I will dump it just as soon as I find something with good damage, the bad luck continues!
Thank you for the suggestion kestegs, I never even considered that! Luckily I was able to gamble a rare bastard sword, and that's what I am using together with bash.
I was able to score a point into double throw and I now have 2 balanced axes for double throw on weapon switch. I am starting to use throwing weapons more than my sword... this is turning into a very strange barbarian indeed.
I play on /players 3 right now and my damage output still sucks.
Randozon does very low damage, and gems is my primary form of getting more. I waste a lot of arrows on p8, pewpew! Waiting for a new bow or something viable.
Level 18
Her stats are : 44, 49, 38, 44
Her skills are :
- 1 jab
- 2 power strike
- 1 impale
- 5 inner sight (My first 4 levels, trying to get critical hit, were all IS...)
- 2 critical strike
- 1 cold arrow
- 1 fire arrow.
I know it's a very old tournament but I'm fond of it. As the rules state that anyone anytime can join, here I am with Ion, an unfortunate paladin with an Act 2 defiance merc (both randomly elected). We will play 1.11.
I realize that a paladin is not the best class for this tournament, though an Act 2 merc could get Ion pretty far. It could have been worse, I know. Any thoughts about this draw are welcome, if people are still watching this tourney.
For now, Ion is at the Cold Plains waypoint with a chipped topaz stuck in his cap. The first skill point went to Smite so I decided to wait until level 6 to place other points as Holy Bolt has a bigger chance of getting hit (a prerequisite for Holy Shield). I think that for this class the early development is very important. If Might is hit late, it's possible that the skills will not be that widely spread. Of course, offensive auras are pretty important, but this is the only way the skills might group a little in order to be useful later. So at level 6 I spent my skill points (including Akara's reward), and luckily the last of them landed in Holy Bolt. For now, Prayer has 2, Resist Fire/Cold 1 each, Holy Bolt and Smite also 1 each. Next, I plan to wait till level 12 to spend other skill points. I don't remember enough of the game (it's been a while since I last played) to know how hard will that be.
The stat points have a nice tendency to group in vitality with strength being next. Dex and energy have seen less hits. The random will eventually even them out. Ion doesn't quite have the strength to wear a ring mail yet, but neither the money or the topazes.
:loveblush:.
. Hopefully this doesn't detour you from having another crack?
